Illustration results for easter 2010

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FURTICK ON AUDACIOUS FAITH

"We set a goal of reaching over one thousand people in our first year of ministry. Since the average church size in America is fewer than one hundred and twenty, and the first rule of goal setting is attainability, I guess we were overshooting it a bit. But we wanted to see God accomplish something so exponentially amazing that it would leave no doubt who deserved the credit. In fact, several times during those months of casting vision, I told our little group, ‘I want to know what it means to live life and do ministry at the speed of God. I want to see God do so much so fast that the world will have to take notice.’…The story of our church is still being told…But…after just four years of ministry, our church has grown to more than six thousand regular attendees. Since our opening day more than five thousand people have publicly professed faith in Christ. I’ll never forget the time we baptized over a thousand adults in a two-week period. (One Easter) over seven hundred people committed their lives to Christ…If we have the audacity to ask, God has the ability to perform…The same power that stopped the sun and raised Christ from the grave lives in every believer. God still demonstrates his power and supplies his provision in direct proportion to the faith of his children."

(Steven Furtick - "Sun Stand Still: What Happens When You Dare to as God for the Impossible" - Multnomah Books, 2010 - pg. 15-16)

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ZACHARIAS: CHANGED LIVES SHOW THE TRUTH OF CHRIST

In his book Has Christianity Failed You? Ravi Zacharias points to one of the greatest proofs for the truth of Christ and the reality of his resurrection: the changed lives of Christians. He writes:

"During the course of nearly 40 years, I have traveled to virtually every continent and seen or heard some of the most amazing testimonies of God's intervention in the most extreme circumstances. I have seen hardened criminals touched by the message of Jesus Christ and their hearts turned toward good in a way that no amount or rehabilitation could have accomplished. I have seen ardent followers of radical belief systems turned from being violent, brutal terrorists to becoming mild, tenderhearted followers of Jesus Christ. I have seen nations where the gospel, banned and silenced by governments, has nevertheless conquered the ethos and mind-set of an entire culture."

Then in his own words Zacharias lists examples of Christ's power to transform lives:

"In the middle of the twentieth century, after destroying all of the Christian seminary libraries in the country, Chairman Mao declared that...Christianity had been permanently removed from China, never to make a return. On Easter Sunday in 2009, [however] ... the leading English language newspaper in Hong Kong published a picture of Tiananmen Square on page 1, with Jesus replacing Chairman Mao's picture on the gigantic banner, and the words 'Christ is Risen' below it."

"I have also been in the Middle East and marveled at the commitment of young people who have risked their lives to attend a Bible study...I have talked to CEOs of large companies in Islamic nations who testify to seeing Jesus in visions and dreams and wonder what it all means. The British author A. N. Wilson, who only a few years ago was known for his scathing attacks on Christianity...celebrated Easter [in 2009] at a church with a group of other church members, proclaiming that that the story of the Jesus of the Gospels is the only story that makes sense out of life and its challenges. [Wilson said], 'My own return to faith has surprised none more than myself... . My belief has come about in large measure because of the lives and examples of people I have known--not the famous, not saints, but friends and relations who have lived, and faced death, in light of the resurrection story, or in the quiet acceptance that they have a future after they die.'

"Matthew Parris [a British atheist who visited Malawi in 2008] wrote an article titled 'As an atheist, I truly believe Africa needs God.' [Parris wrote], 'I've become convinced of the enormous contribution that Christian evangelism makes in Africa... . I used to avoid this truth...but Christians black and white, working in Africa, do heal the sick, do teach people to read and write; and only the severest kind of secularist could see a mission hospital or school and say the world would be better without it."

[Source: Ravi Zacharias, Has Christianity Failed You? (Zondervan, 2010), pp. 105-107]

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RAVI ZACHARIAS: CHANGED LIVES SHOW THE TRUTH OF CHRIST

In his book Has Christianity Failed You? Ravi Zacharias points to one of the greatest proofs for the truth of Christ and the reality of his resurrection: the changed lives of Christians. He writes:

"During the course of nearly 40 years, I have traveled to virtually every continent and seen or heard some of the most amazing testimonies of God’s intervention in the most extreme circumstances. I have seen hardened criminals touched by the message of Jesus Christ and their hearts turned toward good in a way that no amount or rehabilitation could have accomplished. I have seen ardent followers of radical belief systems turned from being violent, brutal terrorists to becoming mild, tenderhearted followers of Jesus Christ. I have seen nations where the gospel, banned and silenced by governments, has nevertheless conquered the ethos and mind-set of an entire culture."

Then in his own words, Zacharias lists examples of Christ’s power to transform lives:

"In the middle of the twentieth century, after destroying all of the Christian seminary libraries in the country, Chairman Mao declared that...Christianity had been permanently removed from China, never to make a return. On Easter Sunday in 2009, [however] the leading English language newspaper in Hong Kong published a picture of Tiananmen Square on page 1, with Jesus replacing Chairman Mao’s picture on the gigantic banner, and the words "Christ is Risen" below it.

"I have also been in the Middle East and marveled at the commitment of young people who have risked their lives to attend a Bible study...I have talked to CEOs of large companies in Islamic nations who testify to seeing Jesus in visions and dreams and wonder what it all means. The British author A. N. Wilson, who only a few years ago was known for his scathing attacks on Christianity...celebrated Easter [in 2009] at a church with a group of other church members, proclaiming that that the story of the Jesus of the Gospels is the only story that makes sense out of life and its challenges. [Wilson said], 'My own return to faith has surprised none more than myself...My belief has come about in large measure because of the lives and examples of people I have known—not the famous, not saints, but friends and relations who have lived, and faced death, in light of the resurrection story, or in the quiet acceptance that they have a future after they die.'

"Matthew Parris [a British atheist who visited Malawi in 2008] wrote an article titled "As an atheist, I truly believe Africa needs God." [Parris wrote], 'I’ve become convinced of the enormous contribution that Christian evangelism makes in Africa...I used to avoid this truth...but Christians black and white, working in Africa, do heal the sick, do teach people to read and write; and only the severest kind of secularist could see a mission hospital or school and say the world would be better without it."

[Ravi Zacharias, Has Christianity Failed You? (Zondervan, 2010), pp. 105-107. From a sermon by Michael McCartney, Experience the Spirit in the Resurrection, 5/11/2011]